News Cuttings

IADC Career Connection (ICC) held its second Returning Military Campaign (RMC) Job Fair at Fort Hood, Texas, on 14 May. It was held in conjunction with the Army Career Alumni Program Semi-Annual Job Fair, which attracted 170 companies from across the US. Ten IADC member companies participated: Bandera Drilling, Chesapeake, ENSCO, Grey Wolf Drilling, Helmerich & Payne, Nabors International, Parker Drilling, Patterson UTI, Pride International and Transocean. Recruiters met with more than 2,000 military – including artillery soldiers, infantrymen, medics, mechanics, electricians, aviators and even retiring officers – and their families.

Ann Brazzel, vice president of Bandera Drilling, commented, “The young men and women at Fort Hood were a delight to meet. They were prepared with resumes and questions about what was required to work in our industry and at our company.”

IADC believes that by working together as an industry, we can attract our future workforce while simultaneously communicating a positive story to the general public, said ICC manager Linda Silinsky Kephart.

A RMC job fair at Fort Carson in Colorado Springs is in the planning stages, with three companies already signed on to participate. Drilling contractors interested in participating should contact Ms Silinsky Kephart atlinda.silinsky-kephart@iadc.org.This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

To learn more about IADC Career Connection, please visit www.careers.iadc.org.

North Sea Chapter presents annual Safety Awards

Back row from left are: Peter de Bruijne, Sam Croft, Steve Coghill, all of Noble Drilling; news presenter Jackie Bird; Donald MacFarlane of NOV Brandt; and Roger Hodgson of KCA DEUTAG. Front row from left are Gert-Jan Windhorst of Noble; Gavin Sutherland and Jim Cameron of KCA DEUTAG; Russell Robertson of Transocean; Clement Ejebu of Stena Drilling; and Ivor McBean of Diamond Offshore.

IADC North Sea Chapter (NSC) chairman Steve Rae of Seawell announced winners of the 2008 IADC NSC Safety Awards at the group’s annual dinner in Aberdeen on 16 May. Performance awards were presented for jackups, semisubmersibles and platforms based on safety statistics for 2007. Noble Drilling won in the jackup category, with Rowan Drilling as runner-up. Noble also won in the platform category, with KCA DEUTAG as runner-up. The semisubmersibles award went to Stena Drilling, with Diamond Offshore as the runner-up.

This year’s Merit Awards recognised operations/installations that achieved extended periods without a Restricted Work Transfer Case or above. Awards were given to Noble for the Clair Platform and to KCA DEUTAG for the Kvitebjørn Platform.

The Noble Piet van Ede, which has received several merit awards in recent years, was presented with an outstanding achievement award for working 10 years without a lost-time incident.

An IADC NSC Associate Member Award recognising safety innovations was presented to NOV Brandt for its VSM 300 Shale Shaker. The Chairman’s Special Award went to Russell Robertson, who has been seconded from his employing company Transocean to Step Change in Safety. The award recognises Mr Robertson’s dedication on behalf of IADC through his 30-month period of secondment

IADC members receive Service Awards

Two long-time industry contributors were recognized with IADC Exemplary Service Awards at the World Drilling 2008 Conference & Exhibition on 11 July 2008. IADC president Dr Lee Hunt presented the awards to Dominique Dupuis of Pride International and Pierre Gie of TOTAL during the conference’s opening session.

Mr Dupuis, head of drilling engineering at Pride and vice president at Horwell, holds a mechanics degree from ENSM and degrees for drilling technical courses at the French Petroleum Institute. He has long been a member of the IADC/SPE Drilling Conference program committee, as well as a member of the IADC European Working Group. Mr Gie is global rig coordinator and coordinator for service companies in drilling for TOTAL. He earned an MS degree from Ecole Centrale de Lille and a petroleum engineering degree from Ecole Nationale Superieure du Petrole et des Moteurs in France. He also holds an MS in economics from the Lille University. He has served in within TOTAL in Algeria, Indonesia, Italy, Norway and Scotland, and has served for several years on the IADC World Drilling program committee.